Not Your Grandmother's Exercise Routine

Easing Into a Fitness Routine

If you haven’t worked out for a while, you might feel a bit overwhelmed by the prospect. You might see young people out jogging, tossing tires around at a fitness boot camp in the local park, or screaming by on their racing bicycles and think, “There’s no way I’ll ever be able to do that!”

Relax! You don’t have to!There are many ways to start getting fit again without taking to anything extreme. While you are looking around for a workout that will suit your particular needs (we do talk about the Old School New Body F4X training system elsewhere on this site that may interest you), here are a few things you can experiment with starting right now.

Yes, right now!You can STAND UP while you read this article! Chances are you are sitting down. Stand up instead, and raise yourself up and down on your toes, just to get your legs moving.

Move: Move your arms around – maybe extend them out to your sides and make circular motions, just to move them while you read. See? You’ve done something different!

I’ll offer up a few other suggestions – most of which you’ve likely heard before, but they are easy ways to just get the ball rolling.

The Obvious: Park further away from entrances to stores so that you’ll walk more. Take the stairs instead of the elevator when it’s safe. In other words, you might not feel comfortable walking up stairs in a gloomy and deserted building, but in a store you might! If you are in a store with an escalator, walk up instead of letting the escalator do all the work.

Walk! If you have a pet dog, chances are you already do walk. There’s nothing like having a dog to insist that you get outside! PLAY with your dog – just throw a ball or Frisbee a few dozen times, and you’ll feel it!

Lean! When you’re in the kitchen, stop what you’re doing and lean against the counter in a semi “plank” position for a few seconds. Almost like a push-up against the counter. You’ll be working your upper body. Make a note and put it on the counter if you have to, in order to remind yourself to do it regularly.

Stretch! Get your muscles warmed up first by either walking – or even after your shower – and very gently move into a stretch. Don’t “bounce” in any stretch; simply get into the stretch and hold the position for approximately 15 seconds. Make sure it’s enough of a stretch to feel it, but not so much that it causes pain. It’s easy to find stretches that you can do. Check YouTube and search for healthy stretches for your back, for your hips, hamstrings, etc.

It’s important to start stretching, because once you find a workout or fitness routine, you’ll want to stretch after your workout sessions. So get started on that now.

Lift! Finally, get yourself a pair of 2-pound dumbbells and put them in the living room or sitting room – wherever you have your television. Whenever there is a commercial break, stand up and pick up those dumbbells and do some simple arm exercises and light squats during the break.

Just try it– and log how many times during the course of an evening of television you stand up and move around. You may be surprised to see that you’ve logged a half an hour of exercise before you know it!